franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams) (10/06/87)
[Not food] As promised, I now have available a Smalltalk/V [TM] decompiler. It runs to over 1200 lines, however, so unless I am overwhelmed by requests, I will be mailing it to those who want it instead of posting it. The Smalltalk/V image, as shipped, comes with the Compiler and related classes hidden; it is possible to use the product for some time without realizing that many of them are even present. The file I have unhides the hidden classes, defines a Decompiler class, and uses the Decompiler to decompile all the source code for which the source has been deleted. I am distributing copies of this file free via net-mail; if you want a copy, just drop me a note and I will send it to you. Be sure to include a path I can use from Usenet. -- Frank Adams ihnp4!philabs!pwa-b!mmintl!franka Ashton-Tate 52 Oakland Ave North E. Hartford, CT 06108
franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams) (10/15/87)
[Not food] I recently posted an article offering to send my Smalltalk/V [TM] decompiler to anyone who wanted it. I have since been contacted by Digitalk, who threatened to take me to court if I proceeded. I still intend to send out the decompiler, but I will be seeing a lawyer before I do so. Anyone who wants a copy and has not yet requested one should send me the request, but please do not send followup requests. Whatever happens, I will inform the net. P.s. If anyone knows of a good lawyer in this field in New England or New York, please let me know. I'm not quite sure where to look. -- Frank Adams ihnp4!philabs!pwa-b!mmintl!franka Ashton-Tate 52 Oakland Ave North E. Hartford, CT 06108
daveb@geac.UUCP (10/20/87)
I have taken the liberty of cross-posting the first article of
this discussion to misc.legal.
--dave
--
David Collier-Brown. {mnetor|yetti|utgpu}!geac!daveb
Geac Computers International Inc., | Computer Science loses its
350 Steelcase Road,Markham, Ontario, | memory (if not its mind)
CANADA, L3R 1B3 (416) 475-0525 x3279 | every 6 months.chip@ateng.UUCP (10/22/87)
In article <2490@mmintl.UUCP> franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams) writes: > >I recently posted an article offering to send my Smalltalk/V [TM] decompiler >to anyone who wanted it. I have since been contacted by Digitalk, who >threatened to take me to court if I proceeded. What pomposity and arrogance! I think that I will refrain from buying Digitalk products until they stop threatening bright, imaginative people with legal action because they are going to reveal how a widely disseminated product works. There is no question of violation of contract here. Mr. Adams simply examined carefully the program he purchased, and he was about to assist the great body of Digitalk users by sharing the results of his examination. How sad that Digitalk wants to restrain their users in this way. I think that today's big winner is Softsmarts ... -- Chip Salzenberg "chip@ateng.UUCP" or "{uunet,usfvax2}!ateng!chip" A.T. Engineering My employer's opinions are not mine, but these are. "Gentlemen, your work today has been outstanding. I intend to recommend you all for promotion -- in whatever fleet we end up serving." - JTK
jfh@killer.UUCP (10/23/87)
In article <57@ateng.UUCP>, chip@ateng.UUCP (Chip Salzenberg) writes: > In article <2490@mmintl.UUCP> franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams) writes: > > > >I recently posted an article offering to send my Smalltalk/V [TM] decompiler > >to anyone who wanted it. I have since been contacted by Digitalk, who > >threatened to take me to court if I proceeded. > > What pomposity and arrogance! > > I think that I will refrain from buying Digitalk products until they stop > threatening bright, imaginative people with legal action because they are > going to reveal how a widely disseminated product works. > > There is no question of violation of contract here. Mr. Adams simply > examined carefully the program he purchased, and he was about to assist > the great body of Digitalk users by sharing the results of his examination. > How sad that Digitalk wants to restrain their users in this way. > > I think that today's big winner is Softsmarts ... > > -- > Chip Salzenberg "chip@ateng.UUCP" or "{uunet,usfvax2}!ateng!chip" I am a part-time software consultant who actually makes money from the work I do on the side. For this reason, I am very sensitive to claims concerning copyrighted and licensed software. Most of us independent types use the money we make on the side (least ways the ones I know) to buy extra little things. Stealing the work we do robs us of the finer things in life, like getting the car fixed. Someone owns the products in question, in this case Digitalk and their share holders. Producing a product that is illegally produced is stealing money from the owners of the original product. When Chip writes "There is no question of violation of contract here. Mr. Adams simply examined carefully the program he purchased, ..." I wonder how Mr. Adams carefully examined the program. Did he read the documentation? I doubt it. If Digitalk had published the documentation on the output file format, I think they would know better than to threaten suit for someone using that information. Maybe he examined it with a disassembler? Most software is copyrighted. This copyright grants only certain rights to the user, in the case of software, usually only the right to load the program into memory to be executed. Loading a program into memory to be disassembled is not permitted in that case. Even still, many of the licenses I have seen expressly forbid reverse engineering a piece of software by whatever means. So, once again Mr. Adams in all likelyhood had no business with his nose being where it was. Perhaps Digitalk feels Mr. Adams could not have legally produced his work. I would guess that Mr. Adams disagrees, supposing he actually didn't do anything illegal. In that case, it would be a matter for the courts to decide, and not one for us to accuse Digitalk of being wrong. If anyone on this net were to steal from me, I would surely do my best to have their ass. Theft is theft, whether or not a physical object is involved. - John. -- John F. Haugh II HECI Exploration Co. Inc. UUCP: ...!ihnp4!killer!jfh 11910 Greenville Ave, Suite 600 "Don't Have an Oil Well?" Dallas, TX. 75243 " ... Then Buy One!" (214) 231-0993
daveb@geac.UUCP (10/25/87)
In article <1892@killer.UUCP> jfh@killer.UUCP (The Beach Bum) writes: | Most software is copyrighted. This copyright grants only certain rights to | the user, in the case of software, usually only the right to load the | program into memory to be executed. Loading a program into memory to be | disassembled is not permitted in that case. Even still, many of the | licenses I have seen expressly forbid reverse engineering a piece of | software by whatever means. So, once again Mr. Adams in all likelyhood | had no business with his nose being where it was. Please! Don't confuse licenses with copyright. I'm confused enough without a statement from Mr. Adams about the details of his situation. -- David Collier-Brown. {mnetor|yetti|utgpu}!geac!daveb Geac Computers International Inc., | Computer Science loses its 350 Steelcase Road,Markham, Ontario, | memory (if not its mind) CANADA, L3R 1B3 (416) 475-0525 x3279 | every 6 months.
chip@ateng.UUCP (10/27/87)
Okay, folks, I was wrong... >> In article <2490@mmintl.UUCP> franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams) writes: >>>I recently posted an article offering to send my Smalltalk/V [TM] >>>decompiler to anyone who wanted it. I have since been contacted by >>>Digitalk, who threatened to take me to court if I proceeded. In article <57@ateng.UUCP>, I wrote: >> [General anti-lawsuit flamage] >> There is no question of violation of contract here. In article <1892@killer.UUCP> jfh@killer.UUCP (The Beach Bum) writes: >[...] Loading a program into memory to be >disassembled is not permitted in that case. Even still, many of the >licenses I have seen expressly forbid reverse engineering a piece of >software by whatever means. True enough; there _is_ a question of violation of contract. I retract my flame. I also wrote: >> I think that today's big winner is Softsmarts ... I still believe this (although I would also include ParcPlace Systems). I don't think that I'm the only programmer who prefers to use Smalltalk systems with _complete_ source code. -- Chip Salzenberg "chip@ateng.UUCP" or "{uunet,usfvax2}!ateng!chip" A.T. Engineering My employer's opinions are not mine, but these are. "Gentlemen, your work today has been outstanding. I intend to recommend you all for promotion -- in whatever fleet we end up serving." - JTK
dhesi@bsu-cs.UUCP (10/28/87)
In article <1892@killer.UUCP> jfh@killer.UUCP (The Beach Bum) writes: >Most software is copyrighted. This copyright grants only certain rights to >the user, in the case of software, usually only the right to load the >program into memory to be executed. Loading a program into memory to be >disassembled is not permitted in that case. I refer you to the case of Vault versus Quaid in which Vault claimed that Quaid had violated copyright law by loading a program into memory with the purpose of disassembling it. I will leave you to guess whether the judge successfully suppressed a giggle as he told Vault its claim had no merit. -- Rahul Dhesi UUCP: <backbones>!{iuvax,pur-ee,uunet}!bsu-cs!dhesi
dont@xios.XIOS.UUCP (Don Taylor) (10/29/87)
In article <57@ateng.UUCP> chip@ateng.UUCP (Chip Salzenberg) writes: >In article <2490@mmintl.UUCP> franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams) writes: >> >>I recently posted an article offering to send my Smalltalk/V [TM] decompiler >>to anyone who wanted it. I have since been contacted by Digitalk, who >>threatened to take me to court if I proceeded. > >What pomposity and arrogance! > >I think that I will refrain from buying Digitalk products until they stop >threatening bright, imaginative people with legal action because they are ... >How sad that Digitalk wants to restrain their users in this way. > >I think that today's big winner is Softsmarts ... Well yes, Chip, all of what you say is true, but I also think that charging $1000 for Smalltalk on a PC is pretty arrogant on Softsmarts part. Digitalk are clearly wrong on this issue, but I find it hard to turn the flame-thrower on full blast on a company that sells a nice ST system for very few bucks. I pay for my own computing, if it wasn't for Digitalk then I would not be able to play with ST. (Pity it is sooo incompatible with ST-80). Looking at the issue itself, my Digitalk license (actually a 'Copy Permission Statement') says nothing about banning decompiling. The agreement is quite liberal, so I am doubly surprised that Digitalk should take stand that they have. Furthermore, I cannot conceive of any commercial advantage that anyone could gain by having the source to the compiler - I don't see why Digitalk did not distribute it themselves, they do distribute the sources to nearly everything else. Quite the contrary, it seems to me that Digitalk could possibly sell more systems because Frank has written a de-compiler. Maybe this whole thing is a misunderstanding. If Digitalk is listening then I should really like to hear their side of the story. In the meantime, I think that it is important that Digitalk be persuaded that they are wrong, and I don't think that Frank should bear the cost of legal fees all by himself. I suggest that people who feel strongly about this pledge Frank some $$$ to help him fight. I will chip in a pledge for $25, it is not a lot, I hope that it is a start. -don -- Don Taylor, XIOS Systems Corporation, ...!uunet!mnetor!dciem!nrcaer!xios!dont 1600 Carling Avenue, Suite 150, Ottawa, Ontario. K1Z 8R8 613-725-5411 Canada.
johnson@uiucdcsp.UUCP (10/29/87)
One of the things that I like best about Smalltalk-80 is the
ability to examine every part of the system. It reminds me
a lot of Unix "in the good old days". If the source code
were unreadable then Smalltalk would not be very useful to
me. More importantly, I would never have become a Smalltalk
expert, because most of what I learned initially was from
reading the code.
However, what Digitalk is doing is pretty reasonable. They
don't hide very much of their system, mostly just the compiler.
Although I have enjoyed hacking the Smalltalk-80 compiler very
much, I suppose that this is probably not a good thing to do in
general. The main reason for having unreadable code is that there
are people who want to write applications and protect their
investment. These people are not selling their code to Smalltalk
programmers, but to people who just want to use their system.
("You mean people actually USE Smalltalk?") I always try to get
source, but lots of other people don't feel that way. There are
many developers who will consider this feature of Digitalk to be
an asset, not a liability.
(For those who might have been confused by my message, Digitalk
produces Smalltalk-V, not Smalltalk-80.)acm@bu-cs.UUCP (11/01/87)
In article <57@ateng.UUCP> chip@ateng.UUCP (Chip Salzenberg) writes: >In article <2490@mmintl.UUCP> franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams) writes: >> >>I recently posted an article offering to send my Smalltalk/V [TM] decompiler >>to anyone who wanted it. I have since been contacted by Digitalk, who >>threatened to take me to court if I proceeded. > >What pomposity and arrogance! No kidding! Does anyone have any idea how they could do that? I can't imagine what legal leg they'd have to stand on in court (except that maybe they'd lose trade secret status of programs that people decompiled into source). >There is no question of violation of contract here. Mr. Adams simply >examined carefully the program he purchased, and he was about to assist >the great body of Digitalk users by sharing the results of his examination. >How sad that Digitalk wants to restrain their users in this way. Right. jim frost madd@bucsb.bu.edu
jordan@titn.TITN (Jordan Bortz) (11/04/87)
It's possible that Digitalk doesn't want a decompiler floating around there to protect customers who write applications under Smalltalk; perhaps *they* don't want their code decompiled..... It's hard enough to get smalltalk accepted as an applications language... Runtime versions are becoming more popular. Of course, I'll stick to "my" old adage: "If source is outlawed, only outlaws will have source." Jordan -- +-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+ | Jordan A. Bortz Higher Level Software | | sun!plx!titn!jordan [..... address and phone number changing....] | +-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams) (02/06/88)
[Not food] Unfortunately, due to the threat of legal action by Digitalk, I will not be sending out my Smalltalk/V decompiler. I still think that there would be nothing illegal about doing so, but I cannot afford the time and money to prove it. My apologies to all of you who requested it. -- Frank Adams ihnp4!philabs!pwa-b!mmintl!franka Ashton-Tate 52 Oakland Ave North E. Hartford, CT 06108